The meter’s ticking on Pards reign
ALAN PARDEW knows he has to put West Brom’s nightmare week behind them and find some momentum if he is to save their Premier League skin.
Pardew presided over an eighth defeat in 17 matches in all competitions since taking over as manager as Albion were knocked out by Southampton.
He insists he remains the right man to keep the club in the top flight – but knows results need to start improving quickly.
Bottom-of-the-table Albion will resume their survival challenge seven points from the safety of 17th place – a position currently occupied by Huddersfield, who visit The Hawthorns next weekend in a huge Premier League clash.
“We can only salvage it by getting some momentum. We had a little bit of momentum when we went to Liverpool and got that result. Unfortunately we suffered four injuries that week,” said Pardew.
“We’ve got to stay injury-free, we’ve got to try and get a win against Huddersfield and take that momentum into the next few games because three wins in this division, as Swansea have proven, changes your position massively.”
West Brom’s name has been dragged through the mud after a warm weather training break in Barcelona descended into farce. Four of their senior players – Jonny Evans, Gareth Barry, Jake Livermore and Boaz Myhill – were caught up in the now infamous Taxi-gate affair in the early hours of Thursday morning.
Evans played on Saturday but was stripped of the captaincy; Barry also took his place in midfield but looked a shadow of his normal
WEST BROM SOUTHAMPTON
self. Myhill took his usual place on the bench and Livermore was injured.
The quartet will be fined for breaking a midnight curfew and face questioning about an incident at McDonald’s which ended up with a taxi being allegedly taken at around 5.30am.
Pardew is fuming about the affair following the decision to take the players away for warm-weather training.
“We had had some tough results,” he said. “For it to backfire on me like that was unfortunate. But it happened. I have to accept that.”
Southampton are also in the Premier League relegation zone, six points in front of West Brom, but unlike their rivals do seem to have some momentum.
This fifth-round victory, with goals from Wesley Hoedt and Dusan Tadic, means Saints have lost only one of their last eight games in all competitions, winning half of them.
Manager Mauricio Pellegrino thinks it could be significant. He said: “The most important thing now is to believe in our job and believe in our way from now until the end of the season, in the remaining Premier League games and in the next round.”
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